MIDDLE EAST historian Tom Holland told a briefing in London last night that the world is watching the effective extinction of Christianity from its birthplace.
In an apocalyptic appraisal of the
worsening political situation in the region, a panel of experts provided a mass
of evidence and statistics for the end of the region’s nation states under the
onslaught of militant Islam.
‘In terms of the sheer scale of
the hatreds and sectarian rivalries, we are witnessing something on the scale
of horror of the European Thirty Years War,’ said Holland.
‘It is the climax of a process
grinding its way through the twentieth century – the effective extinction of
Christianity from its birthplace.’
The event titled ‘Reporting the
Middle East: Why the truth is getting lost’ at the National Liberal Club in
Whitehall, sought answers to the ‘anaemic’ coverage of attacks on Egypt’s
Christians on 14 August.
Pre-planned destruction of scores
of ancient churches, monasteries, schools, orphanages and businesses had gone
unreported for days across the West, Nina Shea, Director of the
Hudson Institute Religious Freedom Centre in Washington said.
After the Islamists swept multiple
elections during the first revolution in 2011, US newspapers asking how it
would change Egypt suggested merely that women would be prohibited from wearing
skimpy clothes, and Sharm el-Sheikh would close as a tourist destination.
This was ‘utterly trivial’ she
said. Persecution of Copts, who dated their church to Gospel writer St
Mark in Alexandria, was at its worst since the fourteenth century, with
‘horrific levels of violence’.
‘It has been the worst persecution
in 700 years against the oldest, largest remaining Christian minority in the
Middle East.’
The media had failed to ask the
most basic questions, she said. ‘Why were the Copts singled out, what was
the significance and purpose of the attacks?’
A fourth-century church dedicated
to St Mary – whom Muslims were supposed to revere – and that was a UNESCO World
Heritage site, had been destroyed and designated as a Muslim prayer space.
It was 200 years older than the Bamyan Statues in
Afghanistan, yet the mainstream media had ignored its demise.
Yet there was enough evidence to
show that the violence was part of a plan to ‘drive out the Copts, to terrorise
them into leaving’, she added.
Lapido Chief Executive Dr Jenny
Taylor who organized the event which was co-hosted with foreign policy think
tank Henry Jackson Society, said the media’s job was impeded by
‘secular blinders’.
They tended to report the Middle
East’s religions as a ‘variant of a Westminster debate’ with ‘left-wing
underdogs versus right-wing overdogs and the Christians getting lumped in with
the overdogs if they get mentioned at all.’
Holland said Egypt was not a
developing nation, which needed help to emerge as a Western democracy but had
been the world’s first state, with a civilization on a level with China and
Iran. In Roman times, it had been the world’s bread basket.
Now it was the single largest importer of wheat anywhere on the planet.
The audience which packed the National Liberal Club’s
David Lloyd George Room in Whitehall, heard a litany of atrocities and
devastation covered by Arabic-speaking foreign correspondent Betsy Hiel of the
Pittsburgh Tribune, on the ground in Cairo throughout both revolutions.
The Coptic Church
in UK’s General Bishop Angaelos, former secretary to the predecessor Pope
Shenouda, spoke in detail of distortions in media coverage that were mere
presuppositions aggravating the situation on the ground.
Some reports had
even suggested Egypt was undergoing a civil war - absurdly referring to a 'field
hospital' in a mosque in the 'leafiest', most affluent part of Cairo.
'Egypt will never
have a civil war. Its demographics just don't fit that scenario.'
Muslims had often
protected Christians. The church and civil society together were against
the extremists. Many Muslims had turned against the Brotherhood when it
became clear there was no economic plan.
In answer to a
question from the floor he agreed there had been what felt like
‘silence’ from Western churches, governments and indeed Western Muslims
after the attacks, which belied Islamist propaganda that the West colluded with
Christians.
Shea also spoke
about Syria.
Christians in
Syria were now ‘caught in the middle’, she said. There was a shadow war
against them by rebels, with jihadis and al-Qaeda factions deliberately
attacking Christians.
‘When they
conquer a town they set up sharia courts and mini sharia states. The
Christians are fleeing. Given the choice to be killed or to leave, they
leave. If they stay, the jizya tax is imposed, and then raised. If
they cannot pay they are killed.’
She said
Christians dared not go to refugee camps run by rebels as they would be
recruited to fight.
The so-called
Damascus Plan drafted by the Free Syrian Army for after the war ends, included
retribution killings against any who did not oppose Assad.
but
While
Christian population dwindles in Muslim Middle East, it thrives in Israel
First,
while the Christian population is diminishing throughout the Middle East,
including the Palestinian areas, the opposite is true in Israel. The Christian
population throughout the Middle East has been declining for decades. In
1914, Christians constituted 26.4 percent of the total population in what today
is Israel, the Palestinian areas, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria, while by 2005 they
represented at most 9.2 percent
As documented in the Central Bureau of Statistics' Statistical Abstract of Israel 2008, in the last dozen years, Israel's Christian population grew from 120,600 in 1995 to 151,600 in 2007, representing a growth rate of 25 percent. In fact, the Christian growth rate has outpaced the Jewish growth in Israel in the last 12 years! In 1995, there were 4,522,300 Jews in Israel, and in 2007 there were 5,478,2000, representing a growth rate of 21 percent – 4 percent less than the Christian population grew during the same time....
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2009/05/while-christian-population-dwindles-in-muslim-middle-east-it-thrives-in-israel.html for the complete article
